1. Field of The Invention
This invention generally relates to a device and a method for printing characters on tape (hereunder sometimes referred to simply as a tape printing device and a tape printing method, respectively), by which an input "text" consisting of a plurality of lines (or rows) of characters (incidentally, in the instant application, the term "text" means one or more lines of characters) can be printed on the tape, thereby creating a label. More particularly, this invention relates to a tape printing device being capable of determining the size of characters to be printed (hereunder sometimes referred to simply as the character size) on each line of an input text automatically (incidentally, a line pitch (namely, the distance between adjacent lines of a text) may be also determined). Further, this invention relates to a tape printing method, by which the character size (and the line pitch) can be automatically determined. Additionally, in the instant application, the term "a character" should be interpreted as a letter, digit or any other symbol.
2. Description of The Related Art
Generally, a tape printing device is operative to print an input text on a part of continuous tape if necessary, and is also operative to cut off a printed part (or piece) from the tape and thereafter eject the cut part of the tape therefrom. Recently, in view of the fact that a piece cut off from tape (hereunder sometimes referred to simply as a label) is put to a number of use, there has been proposed a tape printing device which can print not only an input text consisting of a single line of characters but another input text consisting of two or more lines of characters on a label.
In case of such a tape printing device, a user can designate or specify the number of lines of characters of an input text, the size of the characters and a line pitch, freely. However, in case of the conventional tape printing device, the size of the characters of and the line pitch corresponding to each line are designated separately from each other. Therefore, especially, in case where an input text consists of a large number of lines of characters, it takes a great deal of time to perform the designating of the character sizes and the line pitches on all of the lines of the characters of the text. Thus, the conventional tape printing device is very inconvenient to use. Practically, in case where the tape loaded in the device is changed into another tape of different width, a user often wishes that a label produced from the latter tape has the similar layout of the text printed thereon. Even in such a case, the size of characters of and the line pitch corresponding to each line should be designated separately from each other. From this point of view, the conventional tape printing device is very awkward.
If a text to be printed on tape consists of only one line of characters, a user can suitably designate or specify the size of characters and so on, because he can easily judge whether or not the text may be printed within the width of tape loaded in the device. However, if the number of lines of characters of the text is not less than two, it is often that a user makes an error in designating the character sizes and so forth and thus a resultant print becomes undesirable, depending on the width of tape loaded in the device.
To eliminate the aforesaid drawbacks of the conventional device, Applicant of the instant application has proposed another tape printing device in the Japanese Patent Application Laying-Open (Kokai) No. 6-143690. In case of this tape printing device, the combination of the character sizes respectively corresponding to a plurality of lines (in this case, three lines) can be freely designated by a user, based on the following information on the combinations of the relative character sizes respectively corresponding to (namely, assigned to) three lines: "SAME SIZE TO 3 LINES", "SMALL, SMALL AND LARGE", "SMALL, LARGE AND LARGE", "LARGE, SMALL AND SMALL" and "LARGE, LARGE AND SMALL". Subsequently, what is called an absolute value conversion is performed on the character sizes so that a text can be printed on tape. Namely, in case of this tape printing device, an operation of designating the character sizes is simplified by designating the combination of the relative character sizes instead of individually designating the character sizes (and line pitches) respectively assigned to lines.
Meanwhile, in case where a user does not designate (or specify) the character sizes respectively assigned to a plurality of lines of characters of a text, a tape printing device generally prints the text in accordance with data representing the default values of the character sizes. Further, in most tape printing devices, the default values of such character sizes are set in such a manner that a same character size is employed as the character size corresponding to each line.
Even in case that a same character size is employed for (namely, assigned to) all of the lines or rows, if the number of characters to be printed on a line changes depending on the transverse position (namely, the position in the direction of the width of tape) of the line, the longitudinal position (namely, the position in the direction of the length of tape) of the right end character of a line comes to change depending on the transverse position of the line in a label printed and ejected as described above, as shown in FIG. 7(A). Namely, an "empty space" is formed, especially, at the right side of short lines of characters (in other words, the irregularity in longitudinal positions of the right end characters of the lines occurs) in the right end portion of the label, as viewed in this figure.
Generally, when a user inputs a text consisting of a plurality of lines or rows by making the lines different in the number of characters from one another, the user often intends to make the lines have a same length by changing the character size, depending on the lines, as illustrated in FIG. 7(B).
Therefore, in case of the conventional tape printing device, a user first inputs a text consisting of a plurality of lines of characters without considering the character sizes respectively corresponding to the lines. Subsequently, the preferable arrangement of the printed characters is obtained by repeatedly performing a trial-and-error method or process which comprises the steps of designating or specifying the character sizes corresponding to the lines (by assigning a small character size to a long line and also assigning a large character size to a short line) and thereafter printing the text according to the designated character sizes to judge whether or not the arrangement of the printed characters is preferable. In case where a label having the preferable arrangement of the printed characters is not obtained as a result of performing the trial-and-error method, the user sometimes takes an undesirable and inappropriate measure (for instance, the deletion of a part of characters of the long line or row).
As described above, although an operation of designating the character sizes is simplified by designating the combination of the relative character sizes, the conventional tape printing device has drawbacks in that it takes plenty of time and labor to obtain a label on which characters arranged as intended by a user and that many useless labels may be produced on the way to make a desired label. The present invention is created to eliminate the drawbacks of the conventional tape printing device.